Progress > Perfection
I am curious to see how many of you who are reading this will relate to this feeling…
Do you remember a time when you were faced with a daunting task? Whether it be a huge school assignment, a project at work, or even a goal to be met with something that you are passionate about? When introduced to this task, did you instantly feel remorse for it coming into your life? Did you complain? Did you tell yourself it was going to be awful and that you couldn’t do it? Did you then come up with a plan to do the bare minimum (or at least what you thought would get you a “good enough” grade or result) to ease the anxiety caused by such a stupid and life-ruining task? Did you then procrastinate? ...Did you then procrastinate some more?
I hope this annoying cycle is one you can’t relate to haha. However, upon reflection, I have realized I have been FAR less than perfect in regards to my mental space when I have encountered these situations.
Since I was such a people pleaser chasing after love and a feeling of worth from a young age, these situations always carried the potential to cripple me. A new task that wasn’t necessarily “pleasurable” by my standards would instantly put a pit in my stomach. Due to the fact that my worth was found in “what” I accomplished and “how” I performed, I immediately felt the pressure to achieve. I truly felt as if I had to be perfect or I had to be one of the best to maintain my image and my feeling of importance with literally anyone.
A great example of this took place back when I was just in middle school. I had gotten really sick and missed an extended amount of time at school. I don’t remember exactly how long I was gone, but I remember the stress and anxiety that took over once I started getting school work sent to my home for me to catch up on. I remember multiple folders getting dropped off with the slightest instructions on how to complete the assignments. I WAS SHOOK:
Because nobody likes to do school work
Because the standard I held for myself to receive love and affirmation as a “smart” kid was perfection
I had no idea how to complete some of the assignments that had just been dropped on my plate. There was so much work and so many unknowns that I remember wishing I could just be sick forever and never go back. The idea of me getting bad grades and losing my reputation as a “good” student (which brought me a level of self-worth that was invaluable at the time) was far worse than me never seeing my friends or leaving my bed again. I would think to myself, “Gosh wouldn’t it be nice to be sick forever…” So that is exactly what I did. I stopped trying to get better. When I felt that tickle in my throat for a cough, I would force it. I went to extreme lengths to consciously try and avoid even the thought of being well enough to go back to school. Eventually, I was full-on faking it. My mom had patience with me until her hand was forced. The school district was threatening to not allow me to come back for that academic year and my mother had no choice but to take me to school even though I claimed I was still sick. My stress levels in that car ride to school were through the roof. I felt like I was actually sick again lol. However, just as you’d expect...I survived. My friends were surprised but happy to see me and my teachers were very gracious and offered a ton of help in order for me to catch up. My fears, like most of ours often are, were illusions.
Now, this was an example of an extreme reaction to a stressful situation in life, but the point I am going to make is that we are more capable than we think. We are strong and resilient, yet we tend to be our biggest enemies. The fear of not crossing the finish line should never keep us from at least starting and trying to complete the race, but oftentimes this is the case in our lives. We used to act out and play make-believe with the wildest dreams when we were kids, but now the thought of pursuing our dreams is so scary that we don’t even start. Then we tell ourselves, “see...I was never going to be able to do it” but the reality is that we are only as capable as we allow ourselves to be.
I ran into this same problem when I began my journey to improve my mental health. The task of getting healthy again seemed so large that it delayed my start. So many instances of negative self-talk would fill my head. It was an impossible task to take on because I made myself believe that it was true. Luckily I was so miserable that I could not afford to patch myself up enough to just get by. I realized I had to address my problems from the very foundations. I had to completely start from scratch. I had no choice but to take on this daunting task from square one.
I have now advanced far enough in this journey to share and try and help others, but that never would have been the case unless I adopted the mindset of progress over perfection. In my example from middle school, I became overwhelmed because I saw a GIANT war instead of a bunch of smaller, yet winnable battles. As I got older, I saw this same tendency with my school work in both high school and college. I was a terrible procrastinator and created so much stress in my life by waiting until I was forced to take action. I would always exhaust myself staying up til the late hours of the night to complete any project or paper. It would be in the midst of the stress and misery at some waning hour of the night when I would realize that it all could have been avoided. If I had just attacked whatever the task was in small chunks day by day, then I could have accomplished whatever it was and maybe even finished with a smile on my face. In struggling with my mental health journey in the beginning, I was able to recognize this pattern and make a change. The change would eventually be a huge contributor to the miracle it was of improving my mindset and, in the big picture, my life.
The change was simple. I learned early on that I needed to fall in love with monotony. Many things that are good for us aren’t necessarily fun. Building good habits tends to be difficult, boring, shocking, and tedious. They take a lot of time and practice, so much so that it usually calls for us to sacrifice some things we really rather would not. An obvious example of this for me as a basketball player was Kobe Bryant. People saw and knew Kobe for all his accomplishments and accolades, but during his career very few recognized the work that nobody saw or glorified. I have heard countless stories of Kobe getting up shot after shot in an empty gym and refusing to sleep until his shot felt “right”. I have heard numerous stories of the hours and hours he put into film breakdown and the mastery of his footwork. People loved to celebrate the championships, but few truly saw the daily battle and commitment it took to be great. After his career ended, people became more privy to the work ethic Kobe had, but even now that it is glorified I don’t believe many people understand that Kobe conquered monotony. Kobe fell in love with the boring things that most players hate, and that was a huge contributor to what made him legendary.
An early practice I had to adopt in the healing journey was morning meditations. Due to the fact that my sleep schedule was so messed up by anxiety, I had to commit to meditations as soon as I opened my eyes. If I didn’t, the anxiety could consume me for hours to start my day. This called for me to cut out the late nights and the mornings of laying in bed far longer than I needed to. I felt no progress at all for the first month or so, but I had no choice but to believe in the process. I thought many times about giving up, but the thought of doing nothing for my situation was scary enough to keep me on the path. Sure enough, well over a month after starting, I started to see some progress. Meditation is far from fun and it is extremely challenging to begin. Think about how hard it is for us to be still in today’s day and age. We ALWAYS have something to do. Whether it be something to listen to, watch, or see...our world is driven by action. Meditation is all about being still and present, which is counterintuitive to our iPhone culture. However, when it comes to mental health, stillness in meditation becomes your solace. I was so grateful for the improvements I was seeing that I doubled down on meditations. They went from 5 minutes to sometimes 30. I chose to let go of more and more of what I used to do in order to make time for what was bringing me new life. Even now I wouldn’t say meditation is fun, but I fell completely in love with what it brought to my life. I fell in love with the monotony. Now my mornings are far from what I ever thought they would be. I wake up before my alarm every morning before 5:45. I immediately do a meditation. I get up directly after and make my bed. This is followed by 50 pushups, the brushing of my teeth, the gathering of my things, and then I am off to the gym for a workout before work at 8 am. The BEST part is I do all of this with the absence of anxiety. This whole process took about a year to get to this point. If I wanted immediate results, I would have failed miserably. I committed to progress instead of perfection and it changed my whole life.
Now this is just one example of where progress over perfection has affected my life. However, when you apply it in one area, you will see yourself start to become more consistent in other areas as well. That is why I now believe that perfection is actually in its essence progression. They aren’t in competition, they are intertwined. A mind that is at peace recognizes that perfection is the state of always progressing. Humility in the pursuit of perfection leads to a new romance with progression. We can always be improving. As my freshman year basketball coach always used to say, “always compete against your last best effort”. All we can ever do is our best and if perfection is your goal, progression is your best friend.
I don’t have it all figured out, but I have found some things that have worked for me. At the end of the day, the most important thing is that I hold onto my peace and love everyone that I can to the best of my abilities. So please don’t take this as preaching, but just as sharing. If it helps...great! If it doesn’t, I’d love to chat and be there to offer help in any way that I can.
And that’s all I gotta say about that. (Forrest Gump voice)
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